What does it say about this show that when it introduces a new character, I immediately start questioning their motives? From the very moment, Tsubaki appeared in the end credits of episode seven I looked at her through a lens of suspicion, however, as of the end of episode nine. She hasn’t done anything wrong, wait, did this show seriously give us a girl with no ulterior motives at all? I mean, if anything she pressed him into a better character arc and helped him see himself as a person of worth and someone worth all these people who like him.
There is something missing in this entire story arc though, one pressing question at the back of my mind.

The set up for this arc is pretty simple. Pansy leans Joro a book, she says it’s one of her favorites and asks him to read it. He agrees and takes it with him, however, when he’s out with Himawari hanging out with her before her birthday something happens to the book. He loses it, it drops, somehow from his bag and when he comes back and gets help from two random girls to find it. It’s all beaten up, hardly in any condition to be returned to Pansy. The one pressing question on my mind at the end of all of this is, who beat up the book? How did it vanish from his bag? It seems all too good to be true, in particular since he gets an immediate offer to work at Tsubaki’s place but I don’t honestly believe that she did it.
Not after episode nine anyway. Her intentions to get him working were to boost his confidence as it was falling realizing that he was surrounded by a bunch of talented people. She truly did want to help him. So that leaves us with the mystery and also, in the process of beating up the book did they see the message that was written on a bookmark near the end by Pansy?

My suspicions now lay with the two girls who helped Joro find the book. In particular because of their placement in the opening next to a certain boy that looks oddly like an off-brand Joro. A boy that we meet in episode nine, I don’t remember his surname but I do remember his given name was Yasuo. [I play League of Legends, there’s a name I couldn’t ignore.] and putting aside an accidental spoiler I got reading the comment section of the show earlier on. There is just something about him I don’t trust from the get-go. Once again, maybe it’s the fact that this show has a very ‘Trust nobody’ tone to it or something else but I just sort of stared at this guy and hissed lightly.
The name did not help.

Pansy and Joro have a fight about his motives for working and how selfish he is being, however, after a talk with Himawari, Sun-chan, and Yasuo. Joro goes and makes things right with Pansy, not working out of debt to her but because he generally wanted to buy her a new copy of the book.
However, Himawari bought it for him. Because she wanted to see him smile, he’s put off by this at first because she used the money she should have used on herself to get a new tennis racket and she was skipping her tennis practices. Tennis is her dream and he wanted her to focus on it, however, in the end, he is grateful to her for what she did. He buys her a new tennis racket with the money from his part-time job and gives it to her as a birthday present and he successfully adds Himawari to his harem.

All is well and good and Joro has some self-confidence now, he’s ready to solve anything. Then we cut quickly to a girl asking him to help her get with both Pansy and Sun-chan as her boyfriend and girlfriend. Wait, what? Is..was that the first-year girl who freaked out at him about shoe licking? Wait, no that’s not really the important part here. More, WHAT? What did she just say? Like, don’t get me wrong. I’m all for Poly relationships but like…That is not exactly the best way to be approaching it?
Besides, not sure I entirely feel like a show like this would know how to portray that even if it was possible at all. That’s where the episode leaves off, with me extremely confused. Oh dear, i have some concerns. Well i’m glad that Tsubaki wasn’t secretly evil and I am side-eyeing Yasuo really hard.
Also, what’s up with Pansy’s mysterious message about being in trouble? We’ll have to find out!